Prof. Graham Cormode of the Department of Computer Science has been
named among the 2020 Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) Fellows,
for contributions to computer science. The ACM is the world's leading
learned society for computer science.

Prof. Cormode is recognized for his contributions to data summarization
and privacy enabling data management and analysis. His work on data
streams and sketching has been widely implemented in many high tech
companies and organizations.

We are delighted to report that Dr Ramanujan Sridharan from the Theory and Foundations (FoCS) research theme at the Computer Science Department has received a prestigious EPSRC New Investigator Award. The approximately £264K project titled "New frontiers in Parameterizing Away From Triviality” aims to develop novel notions of graph edit distance and investigate their connections to efficient solvability of computationally hard problems.

the proposal identifies research questions that are novel, has the potential to have a broader impact both within and outside academia and it is an exciting project that will break new ground.

By the start of the Autumn Term, the department will boast seven new staff who have joined us in 2020: Associate Professor Dr Long Tran-Thanh, Assistant Professor Dr Weiren Yu, Senior Teaching Fellow Dr Andrew Hague, Teaching Fellows Dr Greg Watson, Dr Rossella Suma and Richard Kirk, and Research and Teaching Fellow Dr Matthew Bradbury.

Coming from Southampton, Aston and Warwick universities, our new colleagues bring a wealth of teaching and research excellence, with expertise in areas including artificial intelligence, agent-based systems, data mining, information retrieval, educational technologies, image processing, high-performance computing, and cyber security.

A further piece of excellent news: Dr Paolo Turrini has been promoted to Associate Professor, effective from 1 September 2020. Many congratulations to Paolo, whose recommendation says:

Dr Turrini has maintained an internationally recognised publication trajectory, with papers appearing in highly-ranked journals and conferences. He has also grown his research group to 4 PhD students currently, and developed fruitful research collaborations with several academics in the department. … Dr Turrini has contributed to designing two 4th-year/MSc modules. He has been attentive to his teaching to an exemplary degree, resulting in consistently positive feedback from students...

We are very happy to report that Dr Andrew Hague has been promoted to Senior Teaching Fellow, effective from 1 July 2020. Quoting from his recommendation,

Dr Hague... has built on his successful experiences of design and delivery of teaching in Warwick Foundation Studies, already demonstrating a high standard in module development as well as delivery of lectures, seminars and laboratories in Computer Science. Both feedback from students and references from colleagues testify to his excellence and initiative. … Dr Hague is recognised within a valuable network of contacts on campus, in the computer games industry, and other educational and community organisations, where he is known for his capacity for impactful innovation in the wide domain of educational technology. Dr Hague has also already proved himself in several successful outreach initiatives and events.

it remains to say many congratulations!

We are very happy to report that the Department has won a Bronze Award from the Athena SWAN Charter. This is a key Equality Charter of Advance HE, and it recognises advancement of gender equality: representation, progression and success for all. Commenting on the award, the University's Provost, Professor Christine Ennew, said:

This is excellent news for Computer Science and the wider Warwick community. I would like to offer my congratulations to everyone in the Department for the significant progress that has been made on gender equality in recent years, and I wish them every success in implementing their Action Plan for this area in the coming years.

We are especially grateful to the Self-Assessment Team, and all students and staff who contributed to the questionnaire, the analysis and the consultation. This Bronze Award will be held by the Department until at least November 2023.

Another piece of excellent news: Dr Sayan Bhattacharya and Dr Tom Gur have been promoted to Associate Professor, effective from 1 May 2020. Quoting from their recommendations,

Dr Bhattacharya has attracted a very competitive EPSRC New Investigator grant and a high-profile UK-Israel collaborative grant with the Weizmann Institute... . Dr Bhattacharya’s high standing in the research community is confirmed by his memberships of the programme committees of prestigious conferences, as well as his organisation of international research events. … Dr Bhattacharya has developed a new 3rd-year core module for Discrete Mathematics students and delivered it for the past three years, as well as now teaching most of a key 1st-year core module for the same degree course.

and

Dr Gur has attracted a highly prestigious UKRI Future Leaders Fellowship, as well as growing his international leading publications record. He is also growing a successful own research group, having recruited a PhD student and on track to employing several postdocs. … voluntarily exceeding his workload, Dr Gur has developed from scratch and currently teaches a popular 4th-year module on quantum computing. Mentioning here only some of his other contributions, Dr Gur also … is the organiser of the main departmental research seminar, was an active contributor to the department’s recent Athena SWAN submission, and has been developing fruitful links with several industrial partners.

it remains to say many congratulations!